The 18 Reasons Why 2012 Was The Best Year Ever

Without question, 2012 was the greatest year of my life. And, well, our lives. Bridget and I became "The Briddons" in March and it's been nine months of growing closer. That's not to say we both aren't the same independent (and very different) people we were in 2011, but most sentences now begin with "We." So, in looking back on 2012, here are the 18 things that made it our best 366 days ever:

1. We celebrated five wonderful weddings -- including our own -- with friends and family. We may be biased, but we think ours was the best.
2. We never have to deal with the stress of planning our wedding again.
3. We ran a half marathon.
4. We're healthy.
5. We -- and Oscar -- survived the great hambone disaster of 2012. (In short, my mom, excitedly gave Oscar a hambone, which he excitedly devoured. We all smiled and laughed. Then we realized dogs are never, ever supposed to eat cooked bones. It was a tough and fairly disgusting couple weeks.)
6. We locked up our love on the Seine River in Paris.
7. We stayed in the nicest hotel room ever in Enniskery, Ireland. There was a damn TV in the bathroom mirror. In the mirror!
8. We enjoyed a week of paradise -- and ate about eight pounds of ribs and sushi -- in sunny Mexico.
9. We sat on a riverbank on a glorious sunny day in Breckenridge, Colorado, which, for my money, is the nicest town in the United States.
10. We bought a leather couch. (Weeks ago, Bridget and I decided it was best to wait until next Christmas to make the purchase. So, naturally, I'm staring at it in our living room right now.)
11. We saw the Lumineers, The Head and The Heart, Bon Iver, and Ben Harper -- four of the best concerts in recent memory.
12. We won the New Yorker Caption Contest. (One of the coolest things about this was when the guy at the framing store let out an unsolicited laugh when we brought it in.)
13. We went to a San Francisco Giants game, a Red Sox game, a Patriots game, and a Celtics playoff game. (Mike went to the Celtics game, but, you know, the whole our thing.)
14. We booked our one-year anniversary weekend at the Chatham Bars Inn. 
15. We went to Cambridge, 1 and West Side Lounge a whole bunch of times.
16. We got a MacBook Air and an iMac. (We really, really like Apple products.)
17. We started a blog. This is our 42nd post.
18. We were fortunate enough to do the first 17 things.

We only hope that 2013 can somehow rival 2012. It's a tall order, but if Kanye and Kim Kardashian can make it, hell, anything is possible. Happy New Year, everyone!